Hyperheating the World by Global Warming

August 2017: Iraq sends workers home as “ungodly” heat grips Middle East.

Government workers are given a holiday, power plants fail, air conditioning no longer works, and men go jump in the water.

The women, elderly, and children? They suffer and some will die.

In Lebanon people are plagued with “the humidity from hell . . . it’s on fire this year.”

In Kuwait, birds fall from the sky.

In France, Europe does battle with a heatwave named Lucifer. The heat flows north from Africa.

Dozens of Portuguese burned to death in their vehicles earlier this summer as they fled massive uncontrolled wildfires in areas whipped by the wind that were bone-dry from lack of rainfall.

One-third of the world now faces deadly heatwaves due to climate change.

In June, Phoenix endured temperatures of 119 degrees, which had “been matched or surpassed only four other times.” Construction workers hydrated continually. Arizona pet stores gave away free booties to protect the feet of dogs from the scorching pavement.

Currently, the U.S. Pacific Northwest is being “cooked” by temperatures as high as triple digits in Seattle and Portland. Light rail is “operating at slower speeds because of fears the tracks will expand in the heat and cause derailments.”

Wildfires in British Columbia and elsewhere in the region are causing dangerous smog, which adds to the heat and humidity. The mere threat of wildfires has led to a state of emergency in Oregon.

Huge swaths of California and British Columbia were torched by wildfires this summer as dry conditions and excess temperatures triggered explosive burning.

Las Vegas visitors remained in the casinos to avoid the hellish temperatures outside.

In July, Death Valley broke a record for the hottest month ever recorded in the U.S.

Back in Washington, a draft report by scientists from thirteen federal agencies attributing current ascertainable climate change to human causes including the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, “U.S. Global Change Research Program Climate Science Special Report (CSSR),” has already been ignored by E.P.A. administrator Scott Pruitt and by President Trump.

It is expected that both will ultimately reject the conclusions and recommendations to counter “longer heat waves, more intense rainstorms and the faster disintegration of coral reefs.”

Both have, under the current administration, hearkened back to the days of coal and rejected the science of climate change, pandering to the interests of large-scale energy polluters such as the oil and gas industries, giving short shrift to solar, wind, and water power energy sources.

To access the draft report, see https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/08/07/climate/document-Draft-of-the-Climate-Science-Special-Report.html.

It is noteworthy that “[n]early 200 nations agreed as part of the Paris accords [of 2015] to limit or cut fossil fuel emissions. If countries make good on those promises, the [federal climate science] report says, that will be a key step toward keeping global warming at manageable levels.”

Only two other countries in the world are not signatories of the Paris agreement, i.e., Nicaragua, and Syria. Even North Korea and Iran have agreed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, have thrown in their lot with the rest of the world in a gesture of good will and common sense.

Donald Trump announced earlier this year that the United States would withdraw from the Paris agreement, saying the deal was “bad for America.”

What is bad for America is climate change denial personified and given official approval and momentum by Donald Trump.